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Distribution of Transportation Fatalities by Mode

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To reduce double counting, the following adjustments are made to Total Fatalities: For Railroad, fatalities involving motor vehicles at public highway-rail grade crossings are excluded because such fatalities are assumed to be included in Highway fatalities. For Transit, non-rail modes, including aerial tramway, motor bus, bus rapid transit, commuter bus, demand response, demand taxi, ferryboat, jitney, publico, trolleybus, and vanpool fatalities are excluded because they are counted as Water and Highway fatalities. Other counts, redundant with above help eliminate double counting in the Total Fatalities.

Highway fatalities data prior to 1975 have been adjusted to reflect the Fatality Analysis Reporting System's definition of a fatal crash as one that involves a motor vehicle on a traffic way that results in the death of a vehicle occupant or a nonmotorist within 30 days of the crash.

Water injury data for 2001 and before is not comparable with later year due to a change in the reporting system.

Current version of this table is not comparable with the versions before 2014 because of the categories changing for some modes.

a Light trucks are defined as trucks of 10,000 pounds gross vehicle weight rating or less, including pickups, vans, truck-based station wagons, and utility vehicles. Large trucks are defined as trucks over 10,000 pounds gross vehicle weight rating, including single-unit trucks and truck tractors.

b Includes occupants of other vehicle types, other nonmotorists, and unknown. For 1960-70, the U.S. Department of Transportation, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration did not break out fatality data to the same level of detail as in later years, so fatalities for those years also include occupants of passenger cars, trucks, and buses.

c Recreational includes airboats, canoes, kayaks, motorboats, pontoon, rowboats, and sailboats. Data are based on information provided by the States, the District of Columbia and the five U.S. Territories to the Coast Guard Boating Accident Report Database (BARD) system, which is subject to some under- or delayed reporting.

d All operations other than those operating under 14 CFR 121 and 14 CFR 135.

i All service operating under 14 CFR 121 (Scheduled air carriers). Since Mar. 20, 1997, 14 CFR 121 includes only aircraft with 10 or more seats formerly operated under 14 CFR 135. This change makes it difficult to compare pre-1997 data for 14 CFR 121 and 14 CFR 135 with more recent years' data.

k All scheduled service operating under 14 CFR 135 (Commuter air carriers). Before Mar. 20, 1997, 14 CFR 135 applied to aircraft with 30 or fewer seats. Since March 20, 1997, 14 CFR 135 includes only aircraft with fewer than 10 seats. This change makes it difficult to compare pre-1997 data for 14 CFR 121 and 14 CFR 135 with more recent years' data.

1960-65: U.S. Department of Transportation, National Highway Traffic Safety Administration from data supplied by U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National Center for Health Statistics, and individual state accident reports (adjusted to 30-day deaths).

1975-13: U.S. Department of Transportation, Federal Railroad Administration, Office of Safety Analysis, table 5.11, Hwy/Rail Incidents Summary Tables, available at http://safetydata.fra.dot.gov/OfficeofSafety/ as of July 2015.

1960-02: U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Coast Guard, Office of Boating Safety, Boating Statistics (Washington, DC: Annual Issues), table 31, available at http://www.uscgboating.org as of June 2014.

2003-17: U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Coast Guard, Recreational Boating Statistics (annual issues), available at www.uscgboating.org as of Nov. 7, 2018.

Pipeline:

Hazardous liquid and gas pipeline:

1970-85: U.S. Department of Transportation, Research and Special Programs Administration, Office of Pipeline Safety, Accident and Incident Summary Statistics by Year, available at http://ops.dot.gov as of Nov. 18, 2003.

1990-2017: U.S. Department of Transportation, Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, Office of Pipeline Safety, Accident and Incident Summary Statistics by Year, available at http://phmsa.dot.gov/pipeline as of Nov. 7, 2018.